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LaVernia Restaurant Owner Charged with Shaking Down Immigrants

A LaVernia restaurant owner may be cooking up some federal prison time in a scheme to shake down illegal immigrants, 1200 WOAI news reports.

Yolanda Hernandez de Arteaga, 48, the owner of Los Compadres Restaurant in LaVernia, has been indicted on six counts of taking cash from more than twenty immigrants 'desperate for legal immigration status documents,' and promising them that she would get them green cards and other documents in return.

The feds say Hernandez pocketed the money, and when the immigrants complained, she allegedly threatened to notify immigration authorities and facilitate the deportation of the immigrants if they continued to make trouble.

The indictment claims that Hernandez collected in excess of $100,000 as part of her shake down scheme.

Maria de Lourdes Montano-Vicencio, herself an illegal immigrant, is also charged. The feds say she was Hernandez' bag man, collecting the cash that was paid by the illegals to Hernandez. She is charged with wire fraud for collecting cash on 22 separate occasions.

Both women face up to twenty years in prison on each of the six counts they are facing.